Hospital Mistakes

Hospital mistakes can occur due to medical negligence on the part of a doctor, nurse, or other health care professional who works in a hospital. Common hospital mistakes that may lead to injury or a medical malpractice settlement include:

• Incorrect prescriptions - this includes pharmacist mistakes, improper dosages, administering errors on the part of the nurse, and physician error such as prescribing the wrong medication.
• Surgical errors – surgical mistakes can include wrong-site surgery, wrong surgical procedure, wrong patient surgery (performing surgery on the wrong patient), and surgical instruments left in the patient's body.
• Obstetrical mistakes - this includes misreading of the fetal distress monitor, failure to diagnose fetal distress, and failure to treat complications such as jaundice.

Preventing Hospital Errors

Hospital mistakes can lead to surgical errors, birth injury, and wrongful death and may merit a medical malpractice settlement. As a result, the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations (JCAHO) issued a series of standards that all accredited hospitals must adhere to.

The most important standard is that hospitals must tell patients and their families that a hospital mistake was made. By getting the hospital mistake out into the open, health care professionals will become aware of the problem and find ways to avoid making the same mistakes in the future. The new standards require that hospitals must work to prevent errors, design systems to ensure patient safety, and act on reports of medical mistakes.

If you or a loved one has been a victim of a hospital mistake or surgical errors, you may want to find a medical malpractice attorney for more information about seeking a medical malpractice settlement.